Other Member Spotlights

Danny Greefhorst

Director, ArchiXL

Q: How long have you been involved with The Open Group?
I have been involved with The Open Group since I followed a TOGAF® training course and started using it somewhere around 2008.

Q. What do you do, and how long have you been doing it?
I am director of an enterprise architecture consulting firm called ArchiXL, and are active as an enterprise architecture consultant and instructor. My recent projects have been in the local government and higher education sectors, and range from business architecture to IT strategy and technology architecture. Actually my very first project twenty years ago was an enterprise architecture project for a Telco, targeting a customer care programme. I am instructor for various enterprise architecture classes, including classes on the TOGAF and ArchiMate® standard. I have been active as an instructor for almost twenty years, and started with TOGAF training courses around 2008.

Q: Why did your organization become a member and what does your involvement look like?
ArchiXL joined the Architecture forum in 2008 and added the ArchiMate forum to its membership in November 2013. We believe that sponsoring The Open Group and other professional organizations is important to show our focus, knowledge and vision in enterprise architecture. Also, we believe that it is important to contribute to this evolving profession. Our membership to the ArchiMate forum was also driven by the continuing development of our architecture management toolset which is based on semantic wiki's. This toolset is focused on sharing (architectural) knowledge, and includes interfaces with a number of architecture modeling tools. We believe that the ArchiMate exchange standard that is under development is important to our toolset, and that is the reason why we are one of the key contributors to the standard. The standard is based on semantic web standards, that are also at the heart of our own toolset.

Q: How has membership in The Open Group benefited you, your organization and the industry at large?
Our membership has helped us to show our clients that we are a leading enterprise architecture consulting firm. In addition, it has allowed us to contribute to the ArchiMate exchange standard. Also, it has provided us with access to more detailed information that is only available to members.

Q: What contributions do you hope to bring to The Open Group?
We will continue our contributions to the ArchiMate exchange standard, and will see whether we can also contribute to other standards.

Q: Why is it important for other organizations to join The Open Group?
Membership is essential for sharing best-practices and to ensure that the Open Group standards are improved and aligned with new insights and developments.

Q: What are your hobbies?
I have a wife and two kids that I spend a lot of time with. I also enjoy my weekly game of hockey and riding my motorbike every now and then.

Q: What book are you currently reading?
I am currently reading the guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge, to better understand how enterprise architecture and project management can align.

Q. What social networks do you belong to?
I am member of the governance board of the architecture section of the Dutch Computer Society (Ngi-NGN), chair of the governance board of the Digital Architecture foundation and our company contact person for the Dutch Architecture Foundation (NAF).

Q: Any last thoughts?
I encourage everyone to contribute to the evolving field of enterprise architecture.

Biography

Danny is director and principal consultant at ArchiXL, an enterprise architecture consulting firm in The Netherlands. He is also active as an instructor for classes on enterprise architecture, TOGAF and ArchiMate. He is member of the governance board of the architecture section of the Dutch Computer Society (Ngi-NGN).

Danny has written a large number of papers on enterprise architecture, and has (co)-authored the book "Architecture Principles - The Cornerstones of Enterprise Architecture". In 2011 he received a medal of honor from the Dutch Architecture Forum (NAF) for his contributions to the Dutch enterprise architecture community. Before starting at ArchiXL, he worked as a principal consultant for Yellowtail, as a senior IT-architect for IBM Business Consulting Services and as a researcher at the Software Engineering Research Centre (SERC).